I have always been pushed by the negative. The apparent failure of a play sends me back to my typewriter that very night, before the reviews are out. I am more compelled to get back to work than if I had a success.

The making of the far-famed New York Central Park was opposed by even good men, with misguided pluck, perseverance, and ingenuity, but straight right won its way, and now that park is appreciated. So we confidently believe it will be with our great national parks and forest reservations.

I bade adieu to mechanical inventions, determined to devote the rest of my life to the study of the inventions of God.

Never, never, never give up.

If you do not conquer self, you will be conquered by self.

The United States and our allies are determined: we refuse to live in the shadow of this ultimate danger.

I won’t accept anything less than the best a player’s capable of doing… and he has the right to expect the best that I can do for him and the team!

If you deserve it, go get it.

Most people work just hard enough not to get fired and get paid just enough money not to quit.

I’ve never thought about any kind of prejudice about women in country music because I never felt like it affected me. I was fortunate enough to come about in a time when I didn’t feel that kind of energy at all, and it was always my theory that if you want to play in the same ballgame as the boys, you’ve got to work as hard as them.

I believe that God has put gifts and talents and ability on the inside of every one of us. When you develop that and you believe in yourself and you believe that you’re a person of influence and a person of purpose, I believe you can rise up out of any situation.

The presence of passion within you is the greatest gift you can receive. Treat it as a miracle.

With self-discipline most anything is possible.

Where sense is wanting, everything is wanting.

I just think it is important that you realize, that you’re the best in the world. Whether you are a Democrat or Republican or whether you’re libertarian or whatever, you are the best. And we should not ever forget that. And when somebody does not do the job, we got to let them go.

It’s not difficult for me to put my feelings into written form. I try to be concise and to go direct to the subject. This is what people like about my work, and what the critics hate.

Serious illness doesn’t bother me for long because I am too inhospitable a host.

Do your damnedest in an ostentatious manner all the time.

Being president is like being a jackass in a hailstorm. There’s nothing to do but to stand there and take it.

Success is the child of audacity.

My advice is this. For Christ’s sake, don’t write a book that is suitable for a kid of 12 years old, because the kids who read who are 12 years old are reading books for adults. I read all of the James Bond books when I was about 11, which was approximately the right time to read James Bond books.

Many people tell me that they don ‚t know what to feel when they finish one of my books because the story was dark, or complicated, or strange. But while they were reading it, they were inside my world and they were happy. That’s good.

Believe that life is worth living and your belief will help create the fact.

See, winners embrace hard work.

No great intellectual thing was ever done by great effort.

We like to think about how smart we are. But I think talent as a writer is hard-wired in, it’s all there, at least the basic elements of it. You can’t change it any more than you can choose whether to be right handed or left handed.

We must adjust to changing times and still hold to unchanging principles.

A record deal doesn’t make you an artist; you make yourself an artist.

A good writer possesses not only his own spirit but also the spirit of his friends.

I went through a lot of battles in high school.

People need hard times and oppression to develop psychic muscles.

If you want a thing done well, do it yourself.

A gem cannot be polished without friction, nor a man perfected without trials.

My superhero has always been Tendulkar, and it will be Tendulkar for life. He is someone who has inspired me immensely. Just watching him play for India, I used to dream of winning games for India, because he used to do it single handedly.

Friendship is a plant of slow growth and must undergo and withstand the shocks of adversity before it is entitled to the appellation.

Today is life-the only life you are sure of. Make the most of today. Get interested in something. Shake yourself awake. Develop a hobby. Let the winds of enthusiasm sweep through you. Live today with gusto.

I am a grafter.

In my later years, I have looked in the mirror each day and found a happy person staring back. Occasionally I wonder why I can be so happy. The answer is that every day of my life I’ve worked only for myself and for the joy that comes from writing and creating. The image in my mirror is not optimistic, but the result of optimal behavior.

Positional leaders ignore the fact that every person has hopes, dreams, desires, and goals of his own. And leaders must bring their vision and the aspirations of the people they lead together in a way that benefits everyone.

Let us be sure that those who come after will say of us in our time, that in our time we did everything that could be done. We finished the race; we kept them free; we kept the faith.

In the dim background of mind we know what we ought to be doing but somehow we cannot start.

Hope is not a resting place but a starting point – a cactus, not a cushion.

The Bible says to ‚fear not,‘ but this doesn’t mean you should never feel scared. It means when you do feel fear, keep going forward and do what you are supposed to do. Or as I like to say, do it afraid.

Deliver me from writers who say the way they live doesn’t matter. I’m not sure a bad person can write a good book, If art doesn’t make us better, then what on earth is it for.

When you are a beginning film maker you are desperate to survive. The most important thing in the end is survival and being able to get to your next picture.

Victory at all costs, victory in spite of all terror, victory however long and hard the road may be; for without victory, there is no survival.

I always cheer up immensely if an attack is particularly wounding because I think, well, if they attack one personally, it means they have not a single political argument left.

No pressure, no diamonds.

Nothing is so strongly fortified that it cannot be taken by money.

Never interrupt someone doing what you said couldn’t be done.

The best luck of all is the luck you make for yourself.

Energy begets energy.

I started writing as a child. But I didn’t think of myself actually writing until I was in college. And I had gone to Africa as a sophomore or something – no, maybe junior – and wrote a book of poems. And that was my beginning. I published that book.

Every time I think that I’m getting old, and gradually going to the grave, something else happens.

Somebody once asked me what my theory of life was, and I said, ‚Don’t try.‘ That fits the writing, too. I don’t try; I just type.

It was one of those evenings when men feel that truth, goodness and beauty are one. In the morning, when they commit their discovery to paper, when others read it written there, it looks wholly ridiculous.

I’m definitely gaining new fans, and that’s the key of any success… gain more love.

We don’t want to wait on someone to hire us and give us a check. We want to create our own opportunities.

To me, if life boils down to one thing, it’s movement. To live is to keep moving.

The man who knows it can’t be done counts the risk, not the reward.

I had a rough childhood coming up, and I just took all that negative energy and made it very positive for myself to drive me. I’m a very driven person. I have passion that almost scares people, just to be successful and make it no matter what.